Slashdot Mirror
Jobs in Japan?
Trak asks: "I've always been fascinated by Japanese culture and would love to spend a few years living there. Making a long story, short: my wife just left and I've got some savings, so I'm considering the move. I have a some jobs here in The States that I could rely on for telecommuting work, but I'd rather find a job there in The Land of the Rising Sun. Any advice on where to look and what to pursue? Any horror stories? I've done it all from System Admin to Programming to CTO, so I'm open to just about anything that's available, I just don't know where to begin looking. Thanks."
Japan is a very interesting place to live, and I personally love it there. One job that you could almost definitely get would be an English teacher, if all else fails or if you just need something to do until you can find a better job. As far as SysAdmin type work, Sony is HUGE in Japan, as is DoCoMo. If you could score a job with either of these companies, you'd be set. The other thing to remember about Japan is that company loyalty is highly valued, so don't count on skipping out on a job working for a company. You can do it, but it's looked down upon and you'll surely not want that.
Don't take this too seriously, but some of the links found are written by foreigners in Japan and have some detail of their experiences.
"The Devil does not know a lot because He's the Devil, He knows a lot because he's old." -- unknown
Great! Now you can do reviews of anime on-site for /.! Get packing.
fj.life.in-japan might be a good place on to ask this question moreso then in slashdot.
From what I've heard, don't live in Tokyo. The people of Tokyo itself are extremely xenophobic, and there are many places where foreigners are "not allowed". I also have heard that things become much better once you leave the city, and go out into the country, or to other cities. (This is all secondhand, but I've heard the same thing from multiple sources.)
(And it couldn't hurt to scan google groups.)
http://www.escapeartist.com/japan/japan.htm
Escape Artist magazine is a resource for people seeking expatriate employment, or for a new place to live.
This site usually has many links to Japan based job opportunities.
http://www.1-allusjobs.com/default.asp
Hope that helps!
Knightfall
First question, do you speak (and write) jappanese?
I'm looking to do something fun after graduation, and skipping the UK, but I barely speak more then holiday french/german/greek, so I'm guessing I'm limited to Ireland, the U.S, Austrailia, New Zealand
I've always been fascinated by Japanese culture
Translation: "I have 230GB of tentacle rape hentai."
Karma: Good (despite my invention of the Karma: sig)
Reading between the lines -- the answer to the question you really want to ask is "Yeah, you will." Is Gas Panic still in business?
Seriously, though, getting a job there is a good idea. Getting paid in yen makes life there much more affordable, but more importantly, the workplace is such a central part of Japanese culture that you'll be missing out on an enormous amount by telecommuting. Also, when starting out, go someplace that has a sizeable foreign staff. They'll be a crucial lifeline for the first few months.
I did the bonehead English teacher route (in Nagoya) so can't advise about IT jobs but I did have a blast there.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Read the first part of shogun to learn why it is important to have the right visas before you go there.
I used to work in the Embassy in Tokyo -- I was an intern, but I know they have lots of work to do. It was a great job, and there are lots of nationals that work there, to help you get into the culture.
As a non-Japanese, you must have a proper visa to work in Japan. To get a visa, of course, you must already have a job. Basically this means you have to find some company that finds your talents worth going through a lot of government red tape, rather than just hiring a Japanese.
(Note: Yes, it's possible to work in Japan without a visa, but it usually involves "entertainment"-type jobs such as bar host(ess)ing, stripping, or English conversation teaching).
The English-language newspaper the Japan Times (they have a website, too) has a classified section every Monday. You might consider arriving on a Sunday night, picking up a Japan Times on Monday (they sell them at big bookstores and many larger train stations), and start calling around. I did this a couple of years ago, and got several interviews. Most places can probably interview you in Osaka or Tokyo, even if it's for a job is for elsewhere.
As I recall, programmers were the most in demand among IT workers. Unix admin skills seemed pretty highly valued as well.
One final piece of advice: be prepared to make multiple trips. You may get an interview, return home, and then then called back to Japan for a second interview (happened to me).
Anyway, I lived in Japan for over 3 years (Tokyo and Sapporo), mainly as a student, and found it a fascinating experience and a great place to live.
Hope this helps.
Making a long story, short: my wife just left and...
...i want to find me a japanese girlfriend
seriously, one way to start off on the right foot is to avoid terrible cliches such as 'the land of the rising sun' - yes, i know nihonkoku translates roughly to land of the sun's origin - but this moniker sounds james-clavellish-kitschy and very tired
- as bad as calling australia 'down under' or perhaps the usa 'the land of the imperialist warmongers'
finally, i wish you luck on your journey
- they say that travel broadens the mind
Learning the Japanese culture is a BIG intellectual challenge.
You will always be "gai-jin", a negative term the Japanese have for anyone who is not exactly like them.
A quick google search to get you started.
Japan is overcrowded. Because of that and because of cultural issues it will be VERY difficult for you to immigrate without a job already lined up, and because of said cultural issues; companies aren't exactly lining up to go through the trouble of helping.
One thing that seems to be steady is the fact that they do tend to like foreigners to teach secondary and tertiary languages if you're adept with non-anime japanese.
kind of like the "nig ers"
"crack ers"
"ha icks"
or the "spa icks"
or the "it al i ans"
maybe even the "hu mans"
I'm a big retard who forgot to log out of Slashdot on Mike's computer! LOOK AT ME.
I thought they spoke Quebecois!
Making a long story, short: my wife just left
I can see why.
In a nutshell, from what I can tell from over here in the USA, our economy has things good compared to what they're dealing with in Japan.
From what I've read in the Wall Street Journal for the past few years, Japan is in the midst of a long recession. Layoffs have started to be implemented. Banks' financials are shaky and their central bank has pretty much exhausted what they can do (they've got their borrowing rate down to almost zero percent -- can't stimulate the economy much more than that!) Come to think of it, I recall they're actually in a depression -- people are putting off purchases, now, because they'll be cheaper, later. So businesses are starved for income and cut prices to drum up business; lather, rinse, repeat.
I'm not saying you shouldn't go, but I most certainly would advise you to take a long, hard look before you leap.
One thing I didn't notice in your post is how knowledgeable you are with their language? There are 4 parts to learning a foreign language: reading, writing, speaking, and listening. I studied German in High School and am still able to get by with the reading and speaking, but listening was hard (different intonations and accents) as was the writing (like programminng in a language I didn't know too well.) At least German uses basically the same alphabet as English (with the addition of some umlauts -- the two little dots over vowels). Japanese -- you need to learn a whole new alphabet, let alone the vocabulary and grammar. You've got your work cut out for you. And, if you've never learned any language other than English, doubly so. It was a real struggle to learn German in high school -- it was a whole new way of thinking. It's not like I'd think of what I wanted to say in English and do a literal translation! I had to learn to THINK in German. But, having done that, it's much easier for me to learn another language. I am now in the process of teaching myself ancient Greek and it's so much easier because I've already learned how to learn a language.
In the interim, have you given some thought to going over there for a month or two of vacation? Then you'd have a chance to get a real feel for what things are like over there. You may well find "It's a nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there." But, having spent some time over there, you'll have some great experience that you can leverage should you decide to come back. I can assure you, you'll not see the world in the same way again! I was fortunate to have had a job that paid me to work for a week or two in 5 different countries in Europe. It truly broadened my horizons!
It's good you are soliciting feedback and I hope you are able to garner useful information from people who have actually lived there. So, here's wishing you the best of luck in whatever you decide.
P.S. One last thing: practice using chopsticks. =)
First, visit japan, for about 2 weeks. If you like it, then decide.
Some people love it there, some don't.
I went 2 years ago and had a blast.
am married to japanese so visa not an issue. But I am not sure I would really enjoy living there.
As far as jobs, pick a relatively small town with a US consulate (try Fukuoka) (about 1 million ppl). There are about 45,000 americans living in Fukuoka, so you can get a support network of friends.
Also, I would say that if you can work for a US company in the US by telecommuting then you can get a non-working visa (easier to get). High-speed internet costs about the same as here. Housing much more (think LA). Also, smaller towns might help there too.
Don't worry about a car, you don't need one. Public transportation is world-class. (besides, gas is expensive there, more than in Europe)
If you can get paid in dollars in the US you'll do better tax-wise.
As far as jobs, well, Japan is in a recession. If you can manage to keep rent to $1000/mo with no car, then you can make it on $30K/year (25%tax,35%housing, the rest: bills, communications, food) so you can be competitive here in the US. Also, save up about 2 grand a year for trips back and forth, and administrative crap.
If you want to go to japan and live the high life, you're gonna burn $500 per day easy. If you want to live thrifty, you're still looking at $50/day (including lodging and noodles).
"Piter, too, is dead."
I don't know about Japan, but I just read that he'll be delivering the opening keynote address for Macworld Expo/San Francisco 2003.
I've always been fascinated by Japanese culture
Translation: "I have 230GB of tentacle rape hentai."
Now we know why his wife left him...
More like Judge Ito was an important judge in the U.S. during the O.J. Simpson trial, but there has never been a European judge in Japan.
i suggest beginning by teaching english (as english teachers are always in short supply). suss out the place, get to know the language, then apply for technically oriented jobs. good luck.
If you don't speak Japanese, don't expect that you can get an IT job easily. I went to the first Slashdot meetup in Tokyo and everyone was looking for a new job and having a tough time finding one. The foreign financials (i.e. Merrill Lynch, etc.) are good places to work but they all have budget problems right now. Most American firms have repatriated their R&D and localization so there's little demand there for English speakers or developers. Working as an IT specialist inside a Japanese corporation requires that you speak Japanese.
Yes there are some people who are genuinely xenophobic. The guys in black trucks with loudspeakes saying that foreigners (gaijin) are destroying Japan are a good example.
They are xenophobic
Some people physically shake when you speak to them.
Some shop staff run away from you in shops.
They are just scared of speaking English. They usually assume that I only speak English)
Other people want to practice their English with you.
They seem very genuine, often for a long time.
Some people are genuinely nice. Treat you like a human being instead of a curiosity and are able to be civil and kind. These people have usually travelled or lived overseas.
But my experience of MOST businessmen and A FEW women in Tokyo is that they are perhaps a little xenophobic, but mostly they are just REALLY CHILDISH AND FUCKING RUDE!
People in the country are usually much more polite, and much less cut throat. They are also more likely to fall into the shaking or eager to speak to a foreigner baskets.
No warranty of any kind is offered as to the quality of this post.
..you do not know Japanese.
:/
Repeat after me.
If you watch anime, you do not know Japanese.
Now repeat it a few hundred times.
Okay, so perhaps you actually know Japanese. (There's more to it that, "Waiiii!" and annoying not-emoticons.) What's next? Well, you know how US programmers are always bitching about the fact that companies are shipping work to India and such?
The Japanese are the same way - only much worse. You, my friend, are a foreigner. An outcast, as it were. Why should a company that likes employee loyalty give a position to a job-hopping American Yankee Cowboy, instead of a Japanese native?
You'd better be damned good at what you do, or be willing to teach English if you want a job in Japan.
As somebody who actually live in Japan, I thought I would make some comment...
Well, as many people points out, without a proper job lined up, you won't be able to get the proper visa (of course, this is true for many other countries). So, unless you are willing to work illegally (bartender, teaching English, etc), you have to look for jobs first.
Unfortnately, Japan is currently under recession (for years in fact) that it is hard to get good jobs. Many qualified Japanese can't get jobs, in fact. IT business is particularly bad right now. If you don't speak and write Japanese, you may find yourself very hard to find jobs in Japan.
To make the matter worse, Japanese likes certifications and licenses so much that it is insane, if you ask me. They have system administrator certification (class 1 and class 2, I believe) in Japan, and many companies won't hire you unless you have some sort of that.
Of course, there are companies which will hire you regardless, but these are typically not good companies. for example, there are a lot of temproary employment agencies in Japan. Unlike the ones in the US, many Japanese companies like that will send you to another company (let's call Company B) and work there for years. As a result, although you will work for Company B, you will be employed and paid by Company A (the temp employment agency you belong to). This will give you almost no chance of advancement in your workplace.
This type of employment is more and more common in Japan today in every industry. I know many working in the IT business this way, and I also worked as a chemist in such a company. They hired me very easily, but it actually sucked so bad when I worked that way, I have to say. I had two bosses and two sets of rules to follow (of course, the place where I used to work was really bad, too).
Then, there are work environment issue. Japanese work in harmony, they say. While that may be true, it sure make things hard to do your work, if you ask me. Of course, since you will be regarded as a "gai-jin" (foreigner), therefore, you may be able to do things in different way somewhat (it wasn't the case for me).
Anyway, that's all I have to say about this, and good luck finding one.
I liked this from the article you linked:
"Tsurunen's candidacy aroused considerable media attention, and his relatively narrow defeats each time marked him out as a serious contender. It is perhaps hard for us to grasp the significance of his achievement, as most European countries, and this includes even relatively isolated and homogeneous Finland, are a good deal more multiculturally-inclined than Japan."
Go there for a month and have a blast and come back here to work is probably your best bet. I've been enamored with Japanese culture myself from time to time, which started when I was dating an Americanized Japanese girl when I lived in Singapore.
While Japanese people and culture and fascinating, and it would be wonderful to be a part of it, the problem is you never will be. You were born an outsider and you will die one, even if you master the language and the subtleties of social interaction.
While I respect them and their culture a great deal, please understand that at their core they're among the most racist cultures around. You'll never really have true respect among them, although they'll certainly be polite to you if you're trying. They have some good reasons for their arrogance, but being from the west I would imagine their inability to do anything but look down on you will eventually turn you off.
11*43+456^2
Or talk to an international head hunter like Robert Half. Most of the big job sites like Dice and Monster have listings for other countries as well.
Also try talking to HR at Fortune 500 companies which have offices overseas. They're usually thrilled to find knowledgeable people who actually want to travel.
We're looking for anybody who's good at making games, mainly seriously good animators and programmers right now.
We're based in Kyoto, Japan and are both english and japanese speaking.
n/m
The Japanese govt runs the Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) programme which places foreigners in teaching and "Coordinator for International Relations" posts with Japanese universities, schools and organisations for a year. Salary, travel and accommodation is all arranged by the programme. My gf used to work for the company that ran it in the UK, and many of her colleagues had been on it and all loved it.
A good friend of mine (American) went there to work for the robotics arm of a well-known company. He left after several years, with the complaint that he was never taken seriously -- for example, even after doing good work, in meetings, the superiors in the company would ignore him after he spoke, and would only respond directly to others in the room (Japanese), as though they were the ones who had spoken and had come up with the ideas.
Well, for starters, read about these poor souls who got stranded over there. I don't think they've managed to get home yet...
They have a pretty extensive journal, I suggest starting at the beginning.
-Jeff
No not that one. The legit one. Start up a rock, speed-metal, or better yet, Rap band. Achieve marginal sucess here. Get a gig over there. Know management will try and screw you. Be vigillant, clever, and screw them before they get you. Soon, you will be represented by legitimate management and will also be able to get your full visa. Out-drink everyone you meet, or try to.
I a time of recession or not, any sort of entertainment business can still thrive. In Japan, as an American, you won't out produce, out tech, out work everyone. But you can be more American than anyone.
"When it rains, it pours." --Morton's Salt
This is so true. I'm a white American but I grew up in Japan, all of my schooling was done in Japanese public school. I am still an outsider. Even though I speak Japanese better than most japanese-americans, I know the cultural nuances and everything, I am still an outsider. And yet the japanese-americans who grew up in suburbia, USA will have more respect than I will ever have. And, yes, there is some bitterness in that...
This is my digital signature. 10011011001
I have spent a lot of time in Japan since 1997, worked as a bartender (twice), English teacher, and at an IT company. I have noticed the following in the past few years: In response to previous posts: People in Tokyo are not xenophobes. People in Tokyo are quite used to foreigners. The only places that have signs outside saying "Japanese Only" are a very small number sex shops / brothels / massage parlours. You do not need to speak a word of Japanese to live and work in Japan. I have met quite a few people who have been in Japan for years and can say nothing more than a simple "Konnichiwa". Obviously they work for English speaking companies. Income tax in Japan is 5% (Only people on working holiday visas pay 25%, all others do not). Bartenders and private english teachers can get away without paying tax. Think very carefully before taking on a job teaching english. I have met many people who unhappy with their employer. Be especially wary of large English conversation schools with recruiting offices overseas. It is difficult to gain visa sponsorship from any company without a Bachelors Degree. Good Luck!
just like I'll always be a foreigner because I'm not white eventhough I was born and raised in america and speak perfect american english.
It may be hard to believe, but this is worse.
I guess you're american and I don't know if there is such as programme but in Canada, France, Australia and a few other places, they have a Working Holiday visa. The problem is that you need to be 25 years (or less). I heard some countries have raised that limit to 30 years but I can't certify. A Google search will confirm. That was the easiest thing as you get the visa *before* leaving your country and you can do any kind of work. You are not limited to your visa status (engineer for example). Although "engineer" can apply to many fields... This is what I did. They I got 2 part time jobs in Osaka (where my girlfriend lived). You can find many small classfied papers in Osaka and Tokyo. Some named: Kansai flea market (Osaka) and Tokyo Classified/MetroPolis in Tokyo. These are your live saviour. You can buy used telephone lines for example and you can find jobs. Yes you can get employed illegaly but don't risk it. Japanese people are good people and are most likely suspicious. Be safe, be happy.
:)
After I got my working holiday visa (and due to poor income) I decided to blast a few companies with my resume. Now, I got lucky because that was 3-4 years ago (before the bad times) and I got hired the next day(!). They paid for my engineer visa (3 years) and it costed them a mere 100-150$. I had to leave the country. You can go to Korea which is close if you don't need to return home for paperwork and stuff...
Look for american companies where you have a chance to have an american supervisor. He will understand your stupidities and your american-style mentality. Companies to look for are Financial ones BUT as you know, the economy is doing so well these days.... so guess what..? Unless you're a kick ass 20 years of experience sysadmin, you will have trouble.
My advise is do what people say: Go over there for a month with a backpack and a Japan Rail Pass (you need to get one). Explore as you'll get a HUGE culture shock. It can be easy or you might want to come back crying. I'm not kidding.
Other than that, Tokyo is a blast. It is SO convenient to use the train all the time and you can find ANYTHING like restaurants, atractions, etc. It's SAFE even for a stranger like you. BUT it's REALLY expensive. Make sure you get MINIMUM 500,000Y per year. Double or triple what you pay now for gas/electricity/rent and you'll get an idea...
You might want to practice by sleeping in your bathroom for a week. It'll give you an idea on how small appartments are
Good luck. I had a blast and I regret that I left Tokyo. I want to go back, it IS a great place if you can ajust your MENTALITY to new things.
PS: Look for a headhunter. It's the easiest thing... Look at www.panache.co.jp They used to be the best but there are many other.
What you really mean is that there never has been a white judge in Japan. Considering the incredibly miniscule number of white boys who know Japanese law it is not surprising.
There are very few people of European descent in important positions in Japan. It is a cultural thing, I think, not a genetic thing. There is great difficulty in learning the culture well enough to be considered one of them.
It's been a few years (this was 1993), and I know the economy there is sucky right now, but I can't believe prices have gone down to the point that 500K yen per year is even close to the poverty line.
I'll tell you what the 'effect' is! It's pissing me off!